Hamid Dabashi on All the Terrible Things Being Done to Muslims (Part One)

Hamid Dabashi, the tireless apologist for Islam and slavish admirer of the late Edward Said, about whom he wrote an unforgettable "Ode to Edward Said," has recently delivered himself of some remarks about the vast and sinister campaign being waged throughout the world against innocent Muslims. In Dabashi's vivid and hysterical imagination, it's a truly frightening story.

Here it is:

What is happening to Muslims around the globe? In China they are put into concentration camps, in Myanmar they are slaughtered en masse, in India they have been the targets of systematic pogroms, in Israel along with Christian Palestinians they are mowed down on a daily basis, in Europe and the United States they are subject to increasing demonisation and persecution.

In China, Muslims are not placed in "concentration camps" as that term is commonly understood from the Nazi and Communist models. They are not murdered, not subject to ghoulish medical experiments, not tortured to death, not worked to death. They are in "re-education camps," where they are certainly subject to grueling sessions of memorization and forced recitals of anti-Muslim and pro-Communist slogans. Awful places, these re-education camps, compared to ordinary life, but positively paradisaical compared to the real "concentration camps" — such places as Belzec, Treblinka, Auschwitz, Kolyma. Don't expect Hamid Dabashi to make the distinction — as far as he is concerned, Muslims today are the "new Jews," suffering just like the Jews did under the Nazis. A Chinese "re-education camp" for Uighurs, where the only deaths are from natural causes, is likened by Dabashi to a "concentration camp" with a mortality rate of 99%. The ability to make distinctions is not Dabashi's strong suit.

As for the Muslim Rohingya, they were fleeing Buddhists who, after Rohingya insurgents had attacked 24 police posts in August 2017, erupted in fury against the Muslim minority.

Of the 1.3 million Rohingya, 700,000, or about half, have fled to Muslim Bangladesh. The total number of Rohingya killed to date has been estimated at 10,000. All such deaths are to be deplored, but they also ought to be correctly described. 10,000 is less than 1% of the Rohingya population, and they cannot reasonably be described as having been "slaughtered en masse."

As for India, to describe the communal violence there only as directed at Muslims — "they have been the targets of systematic pogroms" — is ludicrous. There have been killings of both Hindus by Muslims and of Muslims by Hindus. Does Dabashi have to be reminded of what happened during the Partition in 1947, or in the decades since? In 1951 Muslims were 9.8% of the Indian population; today they are more than 14%. in the same period, the Hindu population of both Pakistan and Bangladesh has gone steadily down. In Pakistan, Hindus were, in 1951, more than 20% of the population in what was then West Pakistan; now they are 2%. In Bangladesh (formerly East Pakistan), Hindus were 22% of the population in 1951, 13% in 1974, and 8% today. In other words, the Hindu percentage of the population in both Pakistan and Bangladesh has steadily decreased, while the Muslim percentage of the population of India, per contra, has steadily increased. It is a case of Muslims driving out Hindus — through persecution and murderous attacks, including pogroms — not the reverse.

The largest "pogroms" by far since the Partition of India have been the killings of Kashmiri Pandits (Hindu Brahmins) who have been murdered, often in quite sadistic ways, frequently being raped and tortured before being killed. Thousands were murdered in the early 1990s. Most tellingly, 300,000 to 600,000 Hindus were living in the Kashmir Valley in 1990, but only 2,000–3,000 remained there in 2016. That provides some idea of the fear the Muslim pogroms engendered. Dabashi makes no mention of this pogrom carried out by Muslims against the Kashmiri Pandits since the 1990s. Nor does he mention the Muslim attacks that have markedly decreased the number of Hindus in both Pakistan and Bangladesh. Nor does Dabashi mention a single one of the several hundred Muslim terror attacks with mass casualties — most famously in Mumbai, in New Delhi and Delhi, in Hyderabad, and in dozens of other cities. He fails to note, too, that in recent years there has been an upsurge in Muslim terrorist attacks in India, with more than 600 separate attacks — out of a total of more than 800 attacks annually — being perpetrated by Muslims on Hindu victims. For Dabashi, the Muslims alone are victims; the Hindus alone are the killers.

Dabashi bewails, finally, the murderous Israelis, who "[kill Muslims] along with Christian Palestinians they [sic] are mowed down on a daily basis."

"Mowed down on a daily basis"? Since the Great March of Return began in Gaza at the end of March 2018, the Israelis have done everything they could not to "mow down" those "Palestinians" in Gaza who were marching on the security fence. The Israelis used tear gas and rubber bullets, and only in the case of "Palestinians" who actually made it to the fence, and were managing to cut their way through to Israel, did they use live fire, aiming below the knees to stop marchers. Only in the most serious cases, with those who were right at the security fence, throwing Molotov cocktails and other explosives, including grenades, or in some cases had guns, and were shooting at Israelis, or letting loose incendiary kites over Israel, did the Israelis aim above the knees at those who were an immediate threat to the lives of Israeli soldiers and civilians. There have been about 170 "Palestinians" killed in the 270 days since the Great March began on March 30. That is less than one person a day. That does not constitute "mowing down on a daily basis" innocent "Palestinians" — all of those "innocents" have been armed, with Molotov cocktails and other explosives, or grenades, guns, incendiary kites, and all of them have been intent on killing Israelis.